I really don't like my life as a drummer boy. I really didn't want to become one, what I really wanted to do was to be a drummer in some sort of concert, you know, playing amazing classics and whatnot. I didn't know that when the private said that he wanted me to pick up some drumsticks and drum, he really wanted me to get up at the crack of dawn and wake everyone up, and at night to signal curfew. What a life!

David Glasgow Farragut was a flag officer of the United States Navy during the American Civil War. He was the first rear admiral, vice admiral, and admiral in the United States Navy. He is remembered in popular culture for his order at the Battle of Mobile Bay, usually paraphrased: "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" by U.S. Navy tradition.

The Underground Railroad was a network of secret routes and safe houses used by 19th-century black slaves in the United States to escape to free states and Canada with the aid of abolitionists and allies who were sympathetic to their cause. The term is also applied to the abolitionists, both black and white, free and enslaved, who aided the fugitives. Other various routes led to Mexico or overseas. While an "underground railroad" running south toward Florida, then a Spanish possession, existed from the late 17th century until shortly after the American Revolution, the network now generally known as the Underground Railroad was formed in the early 19th century, and reached its height between 1850 and 1860. One estimate suggests that by 1850, 100,000 slaves had escaped via the "Railroad". British North America, where slavery was prohibited, was a popular destination, as its long border gave many points of access. More than 30,000 people were said to have escaped there via the network at its peak, although U.S. Census figures account for only 6,000. The Underground Railroad fugitives' stories are documented in the Underground Railroad Records.

Philip Henry Sheridan was a career United States Army officer. His career was noted for his close association with Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, who transferred Sheridan from command of an infantry division in the Western Theater to lead the Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac in the Eastern United States.